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July 23rd, 2007
09:32 am - Sonic Youth through the ages
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2007
Too much of my life has been wasted on horrible opening bands. Back in the day, there was a certain punk scene pressure to show up for the whole show. I know some of my readers will be already thinking of how they can mock that idea in the comments section, but the fact is that's one of the things that made punk a real subculture. I didn't watch those bands for the music. Putting on shows at Epicenter pushed me over the limit though. Too many folks demanding attention without putting out any effort…
It also doesn't apply when you've paid more than $10 for a show. We drove into Berkeley, checked out the scene at Sonic Youth, and saw we had a couple of hours to kill. Thanks to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) de_gustibus and arasay, I know that Spats is the best thing in the entire City of Berkeley so we went there to get drunk on the miracle of fermented vegetables and the spirit of cultural imperialism. This is me and an ex-peace punk enjoying our dry-ice-mounted "Borneo Fogcutters":
Photo by cindymonkey.
The Berkeley Community Theater is a 3500 person venue on the Berkeley High School campus. We walked through the doors and ctrhotpink said, "Where are our seats?"
I said, "How the fuck should I know? I went to Redwood with you, remember?" Neither of the SF natives in our group had ever been there before. I hadn't been since my first concert ever.
We found our seats, sat down, and 30 seconds later the lights went out and Sonic Youth came on stage.
1979
I'm sure I was nervous and didn't know how to act. My first concert* and it was at a high school auditorium. I was in 8th grade so entering high school grounds was probably more intimidating than the bands. Still, I was determined because it was one of my favorite bands and my last attempt at going to my first ever show ended with The Stranglers canceling their all-ages gig at The Stone.
I already loved Devo but that show may have changed my life. I can't really remember a lot of details, it was the whole event:* the songs which I already knew by heart, the movies, the synchronized robotic movements of the band that symbolized our alienation in an increasingly computerized and automated world… I didn't really understand it all but I wanted to be a part of it.
When it was over I didn't understand why everything looked the same and why no one else seemed to notice that the world had changed. If I had owned a yellow hazmat suit I would have worn it to school the next day.
2007
It better work out
I hope it works out my way
cause its getting kind of quiet in my city head
It takes a teen age riot to get me out of bed right now
You can't release an album called "Daydream Nation" in 1988 and not have it taken as a statement about 8 years of Reagan. In 1988 I was decidedly pro-riot. Even abstract Sonic Youth lyrics could be heard as a call to arms in those desperate times. I don't care that it's the most accessible song on the album (actually it's probably because of that), but it's my favorite on that album. Hearing it live brought back my reason for leaving the house.
I go to shows for the same reason I go to demonstrations. There's always the possibility they'll turn into a riot.
That's what makes this show a little odd. Everyone not only knows the order of songs but how they feel about all of them. No surprises were in store. In fact, the band didn't even talk until the encores. Were they replicating the silence between the songs too?
1986 or 1987
We're hanging out near the open trunk of my 1976 Buick LeSabre drinking beer in the parking lot near the Syracuse club where Sonic Youth is going to play The woman, who would be the first person to play "Daydream Nation" for me in her dorm room a year later, sees a hand reaching for our cooler. She grabbed it and came up with a screaming skinhead girl. If you didn't hang in that scene, you may not know that skinhead girls are incredibly dangerous. They taunt their men into beating up people like us.
Somehow we defused the situation and made it into the club unbloodied, even if we were watching our backs all night. Sonic Youth were amazing. Thurston had a barrel full of guitars. I screamed for "Starpower"*** all night long and they finally play it before doing a partial set of Ramones songs.**** I love shows when the band can actually hear what you yell at them.
postmaudlin was there that night too but we wouldn't actually meet for another 15 years.
1983
I take my first girlfriend to see a show at the Kabuki Theater.***** The Residents are performing their Mark of the Mole anonymous, art-punk opera. It's the only other play-a-whole-album-in-order concert I've ever been to and it counts because the album came out before the live shows.
My girlfriend hates it. She's into Todd Rundgren. We break up soon after.
2007
Holy crap. I think I'm in the same seats I was in 1979. No way to prove it though. I'm probably just talking myself into this idea.
Mid 1990s
I drove by Sonic Youth playing outside Tower Records. Crowds are starting to fill the street and the rent-a-cops are starting to get nervous. The light changed and I kept driving. I think I had to go to my parents house that day. I don't really remember.
2007
I don't like the Grateful Dead's music but I have a measure of respect for them. They created a subculture and helped make a community possible. Every show had an (unlistenable to me) space jam that was, in its essence, non-commercial. Deadheads traded tapes, but you couldn't record that crap and sell it on a large scale. It was a bit of resistance at every show. Refusing to be a commodity is a big deal in this world. It's a sign of life.
To the extent that I wear skirts and cheap nylon slips
I've gone native
I wanted to know the exact dimensions of hell
Does this sound simple?
Fuck you! Are you for sale?
Does "fuck you" sound simple enough?
Come on down to the store
You can buy some more, and more, and more, and more
Sonic Youth taunts the listener. A big part of their schtick is that clearly they can write hooks and pop songs, but they choose not to. Part of a song will be catchy and melodic, comfortable and familiar. Then some feedback and noise jam takes over. It's poppy and punk but it's not pop punk. The hook might come back or it might not. The world is a uncertain place that doesn't stay pretty for long so you should enjoy those bits while they last.
1986 or 1987
Driving home from Syracuse to Ithaca there 's an intense rural tule fog. The locals got scared because we could barely see. I learned to drive in tule and coastal fog, cruising for parties and leaving friends' houses later than safety would dictate. It made me so intensely homesick that there was nothing to do but step on the gas and drive faster.
2007
Close your eyes and make believe
you can do whatever you please
I wanna know
I think I better go
Many Sonic Youth lyrics can alter depending on how you want to hear them. What does it mean to shout ambiguities? Can you do "whatever you please" or are you just pretending to believe it? Do you really "wanna know" or are you just going to cut and run? Sometimes it's lazy uncertainty, other times showing, through their outward impenetrability of their lyrics, that things are confused and there are no easy answers.
I didn't recognize a single encore. This made me realize that I hadn't listened to a Sonic Youth album since 1992. I was too far away to yell for "Starpower". Why are all the shows I go to these days from bands I loved in my youth?
Don't answer that question.
I spent a lot of time listening to music in my younger days, time I just don't have in the same way now Sometimes it felt like all I had. Some of my favorite albums didn't reveal their secrets until I listened to them 20-30 times. One can romanticize that, but I listened to a lot of crappy albums that many times too. Albums that never had anything deep to reveal. The ones that stuck though… I think I'll be stuck with them forever.
*I have to thank my brother for that.
** Well except for the crappy opening band I can only assume was provided by the record label. The Beat's one claim to fame was suing The "English" Beat to force them to add their country to their name in the USA.
***Still my favorite Sonic Youth song.
****Thanks substitute for the reminder.
*****Then a venue, not a movie theater.
Current Music: "State of the Union" Dischord comp.
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Comments:
thanks!
Nice to see you the other day. Sorry I didn't recognize you. I knew you looked familiar, but Saturdays at work are a blur of faces and it's hard to seperate out the people I see every week and don't know from the people I've met once or twice and do know. If it had been a literary thing, I would have been more clear.
| From: | (Anonymous) |
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| Date: | July 23rd, 2007 05:46 pm (UTC) |
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I didn't recognize any of the encores either. Later I discovered that they were all from their most recent album. When we were leaving, we overheard some kids saying, "Wow, the encore was the best part!" and "Thank god for the encore because of the rest of the show sucked." I'm going to assume that they were younger than me.
The numbering for the seats in the theater made no sense. My ticket said row VV, seat 4, and after walking back and forth, I gave the usher the ticket who led us to what was labelled row 4, seat 44.
I must have missed the days when there was pressure to see the opening bands. Thank god. I did have a friend, though, who was so insistent on not seeing opening bands that he showed up too late for even the headliner.
"When it was over I didn't understand why everything looked the same and why no one else seemed to notice that the world had changed."
there you have neatly encapsulated all formative teenage experiences. :)
ha. I guess I should be writing Y/A novels. ;)
Did they actually play the recording of Mike Watt-on-the-answering-machine?
P.S. I still think of "Dirty" as the "new" Sonic Youth album, even though they've released about a dozen records since then.
It's funny that you write this, last year I wrote about Sonic Youth albums as they have been part of my life through the years: SY thru the years
weird, I don't know how I missed that. Maybe I just had nothing to add. SY aren't on my super-extra-favorite band list, but the albums I listened to were important to me.
Yeah, they were hugely important to me. My friend J. used to joke that we were Nirvana but Sonic Youth was what we wanted to be. I find it hard to explain to my kids just how revolutionary their sound was, it's so copied now. I'd have to say they were my first introduction to the underground, and I discovered the whole SST catalog thanks to them. R.E.M. opened my eyes to the idea of underground music in the 80's, but SY blew that door wide open.
I assume you've seen The Year Punk Broke. What's weird is that I keep missing it when it plays. I wonder if it's on netflix. ;)
I own it! VHS--old-school! I actually bought that and the complete Goo videos on the same day. Susan won't let me watch them with her around anymore...I think she was forced to sit through them one too many times (or maybe it was all the drinking I was doing while watching...)
I keep meaning to check if that's on DVD. I only own about a dozen music movies/videos, but those two are great.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/3562197/721588) | | From: | dcart |
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| Date: | July 23rd, 2007 09:01 pm (UTC) |
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This is really a great post. I have no idea whether I'd have won that particular lotto even if I'd been one of the first, but I really wanted to kick myself when I read (the next day!) that you had extra tickets to that.
I know that I listen to so much of the music from my youth now precisely because I had the time to listen to it over and over again back then. Nowadays, if something doesn't grab me the first time I listen to it, I may not get back to it for six months (or two years). Sometimes, it's great to discover a couple of years later that I've been holding onto something great for a while.
I love the phenomenon of finding out years later that you were at a concert with someone you've since grown to be friends with. I had a friend in grad school who was from Jacksonville. We figured out that she and I had been to four of the same concerts over the years in Jacksonville or Atlanta.
a co-worker, and another Redwood High attendee who was not Gavin, was on it as soon as I started asking around. If I had time to actually think about who would have enjoyed it, you would have been on the list.
| From: | serazin |
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| Date: | July 23rd, 2007 10:40 pm (UTC) |
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Nice post.
I'm also suprised to learn that Spats is still open. Lately when I walk by there they always have the soaped up windows, trash in the doorway, closed feeling.
you know, I kept saying "I think it closed" but there it was looking like it always does. Maybe it's like Brigadoon.
No food anymore though.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/57807757/735384) | | From: | chitinous |
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| Date: | July 23rd, 2007 10:41 pm (UTC) |
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| | for your inner child | (Link) |
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I have a bunch of yellow hazmat suits, and you are welcome to have one.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/1367961/478458) | | From: | gordonzola |
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| Date: | July 24th, 2007 03:07 am (UTC) |
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| | Re: for your inner child | (Link) |
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ah, I think that moment has passed. ;)
That was great.
Especially your discussion of "Teenage riot" cuz exactly.
The Slits are opening for them this Saturday, when I'm going. I didn't even know that when I bought the tickets.
I'm pretty curious...if I had to pick a favorite Sonic Youth album, it would be Daydream Nation. It still gets to me and I wonder if the event will leave me invigorated or meloncholy or what.
PS- ha ha The Strangelers cancelled on you!!! Probably for the best. Better that Devo be your first show.
it definitely has more cred now. I don't think it did then.
well, I think The Slits will be a great opener. As mixed as I feel about them in 2007. Do you have assigned seats? Or is it like a regular show?
if I had to rank 'em I'd go
1. Evol
2. Sister
3. Goo
4. Daydream Nation
5. Dirty
Hmm. I think it's open seating, I've never been to the venue before, though.
I haven't seen the aughts version of The Slits (or any version of The Slits...), and I won't lie that there's apprehension mingling with my excitement.
1.Daydream Nation
2.Evol
3.Sister
4.Washing Machine
5.Goo or Bad Moon Rising
actually i hadn't thanks for the link...that's pretty encourageing, actually. as long as the classics sound good, I'll be happy. also: rotfl at that PUNX =/= NAZIZZZ!!!1! page you linked.
Did ya notice my straw (super long from my scorpion bowl) sneakily taking a pull off your fog cutter while you were smiling for the camera/phone?!
not til now!
I'm so glad you came with us.
Starpower is my favorite Sonic Youth song too.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/64829601/1334908) | | From: | maeve66 |
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| Date: | August 8th, 2007 08:51 am (UTC) |
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I liked this post so much, G. You know I managed to skirt around most punk in the late 70s, despite having middle school acquaintances sidle up to me and whisper that I should check out the Clash, because of my politics. Which I did.
But my backwards cultural life means that I am just hearing Sonic Youth for the first time because my Airman First Class (who is, by the way, twelve years younger than me) loaded 700 songs on my laptop this summer, fifteen of which were SY from Dirty.
In an equally weird generational twist, my mother was in the room when some of it was playing a couple of weeks ago and she liked it so much that she went over to look at iTunes and said in surprise "but I thought they were only really loud! And not melodic!"
During my trip I discussed which Sonic Youth album was the best with my friend's 14 year old son. Getting older makes everything weird. ;) |
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